


Hotter than a Fantasy, Lonely like a Highway

by Builder



Series: Nat on Fire [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Depression, Drinking, Drug Use, Eating Disorders, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, References to slash, Self-Harm, Sickfic, Smoking, Suicidal Thoughts, Swearing, Vomiting, attempt at sex, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-21
Updated: 2017-06-21
Packaged: 2018-11-17 03:26:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11266968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Builder/pseuds/Builder
Summary: Don't touch me, Nat thinks at him."Head hurts.  Bad.  Kind of dizzy.  Like, nauseous."That's really it for the physicality of it.  She doesn't bother to articulate the anxiety, hopelessness, self-hatred, and nebulous cloud of fucked-up-ness that hang over her.  He has to know it's more than that, though.  Just a migraine wouldn't mess with her this much.





	Hotter than a Fantasy, Lonely like a Highway

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after Captain America: Winter Soldier and before whatever comes next, 'cause that's how long ago I started writing this. Funny (sad) story, actually. I lost about 80% of this fic while switching computers. I thought I lost the whole thing, but for reasons I now do not remember, I e-mailed the beginning to myself. I spent over a year being upset about it, then suddenly decided to take 36 hours over 4 days and completely re-write it (and another month to scrub it). While the original wording was lost, the story remains, and I hope it is better than ever.
> 
> I apologize that it's so long for a one-shot, but I think it's infinitely better if you read it all the way through in one go rather than breaking it up into chapters. Also my apologies for the ending and lack of resolution.I don't like endings. I like chaos.
> 
> Read tags for trigger warnings. I think I got everything covered...
> 
> Visit me on Tumblr @Builder051 (It's a lovely sickfic blog).

 

__  
**_She's just a girl and she's on fire  
Hotter than a fantasy  
Lonely like a highway  
_** __  
  
Nat sits in an uncomfortable swivel chair in a cubicle at the DC SHIELD office.  She taps at the keyboard and squints at the screen in front of her.  She is supposed to be filling out an electronic form on the mission she's just finished, but progress is slow.  Her head aches, and her eyes are dry.  
  
Nat uses her foot to shove the chair over a few feet, and she reaches across the desk for her handbag.  The eye drops are at the very bottom, and she turfs out her wallet, two packs of gum, and a loaded handgun before she locates the small vial.   She tips her head back and makes a contorted, bug-eyed face as she applies two drops of saline to each eye.  Nat gently closes her eyelids and quickly looks right and left to ensure her eyeballs are thoroughly lubricated.  She vaguely wonders if she looks ridiculous while doing this.  She wonders if this open-mouthed, mobile-eyed face happens during REM sleep.  She wonders if she has achieved the REM cycle any time in the last month.  She thinks probably she hasn't.  
  
Nat slides back to the computer.  She slips her feet out of her flats and digs at the low-pile carpet with her toes.  Her feet are slightly sweaty, and the carpet is slightly gritty.  She turns her attention back to the electronic form.  It's still blurry despite the eye drops.  She squeezes her eyes tightly shut, and a dribble of saline oozes between her lashes.  Nat pinches the bridge of her slender nose between her index finger and thumb.  
  
"Nat?" someone asks from behind her.  Nat starts, nearly poking herself in the eye as she swivels the chair to face the cubicle's opening.  It's unlike her to be startled like that.  She usually hears people approaching seconds, sometimes minutes, before they arrive.  
  
"What?"  Nat asks in an unintentionally annoyed tone.  She's facing Steve Rogers.  He wears a white V-neck T-shirt and khaki cargo pants.  His leather motorcycle jacket is over one arm, and his star-spangled shield is under the other.  
  
"Are you ok?"  Steve asks.  
  
"Yeah," Nat replies, looking at him like he's slightly insane.  Then she mentally puts together her slightly disheveled business wear and the saline solution dripping to her cheek and deduces his impression.  
  
"I'm not crying," she says firmly, dragging one wrist across her face to clear the offending pseudo-tear.  A blur of gray on the back of her hand tells her that she has just smudged mascara across her face.  "It's eye drops," Nat defensively explains as she dabs the area under her eye to hopefully mitigate the inevitable black streaks.  
  
"Oh," Steve says, looking borderline uncomfortable.  "You ok?" he repeats.  
  
"I'm fine."  Nat's voice sounds odd to her own ears.  Deep and confident, but also whiny.  Tired.  Petulant.  _Go away_ , she thinks at Steve.  
  
"Did it go ok?"  He's asking about the mission.  
  
"Yeah," Nat replies, gesturing vaguely at the form on the computer screen.  "Took out the target, recovered the data, nothing significant to report."  She wipes under her eye again.  The saline has dried to a fine salty dust, like sea spray.  However, its presence makes her feel less than fresh.  
  
"Oh," Steve says, sort of shrugging as he fiddles with his jacket.  "D'you want to grab something to eat?"  
  
Nat's head throbs as she processes Steve's words.  This shouldn't be weird.  They're.not exactly friends, but friendly.  As co-workers.  Nat is exhausted and decidedly not hungry.  She does not want to go out, but Steve needs a gentle let-down.  She wracks her tired brain for good out.  
  
"Thanks, but I feel like a mess," Nat says, lifting her copper hair off her neck where it is starting to itch.  Her voice is still doing that thing.  She sounds unnecessarily bitchy.  "I need to get home.  I haven't been by the apartment in." How many days has it been?  Today is Friday. "Like, three days.  Four days.  Have to make sure everything's where I left it."  _Shut up, Nat_.  _Stop talking_.  She tries to smile.  It doesn't exactly turn out.  She hopes she doesn't look like she's in pain.  
  
"Oh, sure," Steve says.  He smiles back, but it doesn't reach his eyes either.  
  
"You should ask Sharon," Nat tells him.  Number one rule of friendliness, turn the conversation on the other person.  Let them talk about themselves.  _Don't talk about yourself.  Don't be a dick_.  And drop that bitchy tone.  Nat clears her throat, hoping her voice will normalize.  "I saw her downstairs."  
  
"Yeah," Steve sighs.  Then, "You sure you're ok?"  
  
Damn Captain America and his fucking manners and chivalry. "Fine, Steve," Nat says.  "I'll see you later."  She all but dismisses him.  
  
"Yeah, see ya," He replies, taking the hint.  He leaves, hefting his shield and passing out of the cubicle doorway.  Nat thinks the slightly worried expression is still etched on his face.  
  
"Ah, fuck," Nat whispers under her breath.  Quiet vertigo swirls in her peripheral vision.  She tries not to let the scene replay.  _Stop stop stopstop_ , she thinks.  She imagines Steve appearing in the doorway again.  Nat closes her eyes and palpates her eyeballs through her closed lids.  Flashes of nebulous dark red, like lava seeping down the dark rock walls of a volcano, appear in her visual field.  She takes a deep breath, straightens up, and turns back to the computer to finish the form.  
  
The monitor has gone dark, so she wiggles the mouse and is prompted to re-enter her credentials.  Nat taps in her password and hits enter.  She skims the information she has already typed into the PDF.  There are a couple of spelling errors, but she doesn't feel like making the effort to correct them.  There are only two blank fields left at the bottom of the page.  She reads the questions without taking them in and types NSTR in both blanks.  Nothing significant to report.  Nothing significant happened on the mission.  Nothing significant is happening now.  There is nothing significant between her and Steve.  
  
Nat files the form, dismisses a pop-up reminding her of the mandatory medical debrief due in 12 hours, and logs off the SHIELD network.  She shoves her feet back in her shoes, grabs her purse, and starts down the row of empty cubicles toward the parking garage.  Nat glances at her watch.  It's 6:52 pm.  She technically has enough time to drop by the medical office, which closes at 7.  However, Nat feels just shitty enough to think that maybe she should get a grip before she lets someone take her temperature, weight, and blood pressure.  She has until 6:52 am tomorrow morning to submit her body to medical.  She has time.  She can get up early.  And Agent Hill presides over medical debriefs on weekends; she is a little more forgiving than Fury if the numbers are less than optimal.  She and Nat also sometimes fuck each other.  
  
Nat shoves through the heavy glass door to the parking garage.  Her heel accidentally slips out of her right shoe, and she can't wiggle it back on before the metal edge of the door scrapes across the top of her foot to her ankle.  
  
"Fuck," Nat swears, shaking her foot and letting the door close.  There is an angry pink scrape, about two inches long, following the contour of her black patent leather flat.  Her chalky skin is broken, but blood has yet to pool.  Nat licks her thumb, which tastes faintly of gunpowder, and trails it over the abrasion.  It stings.  She remains perfectly balanced on her left foot as she softly presses the abrasion on her right.  It's really nothing, but it adds another layer to her current discomfort.  
  
Nat returns her right foot to the ground.  The pain doesn't increase when she puts weight on it, which is a good sign.  She picks up her pace and heads to her parking spot.  The back sedan is slightly dusty, but intact.  Right where she left it early Tuesday morning.  Nat unlocks the car, tosses her bag into the passenger seat, and ducks her head to climb in.  She slams the door, and the sound hurts her head.  She stretches her neck, forcing her chin to her chest, then drops her left ear to her shoulder as she buckles her seatbelt.  Warm pain and stiffness erupt in the right side of the back of her neck, revealing the genesis of her tension headache.  
  
Nat massages the sore spot for a second, then starts the car.  She opens the center console and pulls out a bottle of Excedrin.  Two tablets are dry swallowed before the car is put in reverse.  Nat drives down the ramp and circles through the two lower levels before her car emerges onto the street.  It's dusk and cloudy.  September and not-quite-fall bring long evenings and tepid humidity.  A few tiny sprinkles of rain decorate Nat's windshield as she cruises out of the metro area.  She rents an apartment in the suburbs, where it's quiet enough to sleep and her building is unlikely to be destroyed if the city is attacked.  
  
The clouds overhead make the sky feel low, and they provide a snow-like blanket of silence.  The car feels stuffy, and Nat feels nauseated.  She blinks hard and makes to roll down the driver-side window.  However, the car in front of her is belatedly braking for a traffic jam, and Nat has to slam her scraped foot down on the brake.  
  
"Fucking Goddamnit!" she hisses.  The nose of her sedan stops inches from the other car's rear bumper.  Nat breathes deeply in relief.  She presses her head back against the headrest and presses the button to roll down the window.  The air is still, heavy, and warmish.  She doesn't feel any more comfortable.  
  
Nat feels like can't escape.  Hair-like floaters web across her vision as she peers into the darkening whitish sky that looms above.  She wishes she can float freely through space and time.  She feels like she is stuck, sinking downward, her muscles tensing as her headache continues to build.  The traffic inches forward.  
  
Nat spies Starbucks halfway down the block.  It takes over five minutes to get to the next intersection, and Nat pushes hard on the gas, making an illegal left turn on red and sliding into the driveway to the strip mall.  She pulls into a parking spot and turns off the car.  She lets herself slacken and lean forward, her head resting on the steering wheel.  Get a grip, she thinks to herself.  
  
Nat shoves her arm through the strap of her handbag and leaves the car.  Her right foot feels damp in her shoe as she crosses the parking lot and enters the dimly lit coffee-smelling store.  Nat looks down and sees that the long scrape on her foot has started bleeding, and like a shaving cut, it has poured out more blood than seems logical for such a minor injury.  
  
She pauses at the milk-and-sugar station near the trash can and grabs several napkins.  Nat wraps them around her foot as a makeshift bandage before getting in line.  She peruses the menu, wishing her vision would get clearer when she blinks instead of blurrier.  
  
She finally gets to the register.  Nat wants caffeine, but not warmth or dairy, so she orders a refresher.  She reaches into her purse for her wallet, almost pulling out her gun by mistake.  
  
"I got it, ma'am," says a voice behind her.  
  
Nat looks over her shoulder, her neck cramping, and sees a young-ish, professionally dressed man holding out a credit card.  
  
"No," Nat declines his offer, finding her wallet and pulling it out.  
  
"No, really," he insists, "I'm not a creeper.  Just, you look like you could use something going right today."  He smiles, genuinely.  
  
Nat sighs.  The guy is a little fat and a little sweaty around the collar of his white oxford.  He's the type that has to rely on generosity because he doesn't have looks on his side.  Nat knows he means well, but she imagines he's a little fat and a little sweaty under his clothes as well, and she has the sudden desire to bash his head into the faux marble countertop.  
  
"I have to go," she says, hoping to at least remove herself from any implied date.  "I have a dinner."  She decides to embellish the lie and make him uncomfortable to the maximum extent.  "With my girlfriend."  
  
"Oh," he says, looking slightly disappointed.  He hands his credit card to the barista.  "Well, I'll pay for this and you'll be on your way that much faster."  The fucker smiles again.  Nat tries to arrange a pleasant facial expression, but she just exhales.  
  
"Ok.  Thanks."  Her voice is unemotional.  She's lost the bitchy tone from earlier, but she can't seem to muster anything but a monotone.  Nat pushes her wallet back into her purse and waits uncomfortably for the barista to make her drink.  
  
As soon as she has the clear cup of light pink liquid in hand, Nat makes for the door.  She raises the straw to her lips and takes a deep draught of the beverage.  It's not cold, and the sweetness makes her teeth hurt.  Nat isn't sure if it's the drink itself or the misplaced chivalry that bought it that repulses her so much.  She drops the cup in the patio trash can before she gets back in the car, feeling horrendously wasteful and more disgusting than she had before she stopped.  
  
The traffic has lightened, and Nat makes it home in fifteen minutes.  She unlocks her apartment and is greeted by the bright green glow of the time display on the microwave.  It's not quite 8:00, yet it feels much later.  It's barely dark outside, but the tiny apartment, with its closed blinds, is pitch black.  
  
Nat doesn't turn on the lights.  She dumps her purse on the floor beside the front door, kicks off her left shoe, and pads into the bathroom before turning on the light.  She attends to her bloody scrape first.  Nat unwinds the Starbucks napkins and sponges off dried blood with a damp washcloth.  The sticky red fluid has seeped all the way under her foot, gumming up the leather of her shoe.  It is not the first time she's ruined a shoe, but something about the cut of the sleek leather takes her all the way back to her life before SHIELD, before spying, when she was a 9-year-old student at the Vagonava Ballet School in Russia.  An unwelcome flash of memory shows Nat, spindly and red-headed, pulling a pink satin demi-pointe shoe from her foot.  The blister had opened and deposited red blood and yellow puss all over her pristine white sock.  
  
Nat tosses the wash cloth into the sink and presses her hands over her eyes.  Stop.  Breathe.  She's trembling.  Nat switches her thoughts, settling on the would-be admirer at Starbucks.  She cringes at her his behavior, at her behavior.  His face changes to Steve's, and Nat grunts in frustration.  She digs her fingernails into her forehead, raising half-moon red welts.  
  
_God, no, stop_ , Nat tells herself.  She takes a shuddering inhalation and moves her hands away from her face to grip the edge of the counter.  She can't dissolve into anger and self-loathing, at least not yet.  Her foot still needs tending.  
  
Nat opens the medicine cabinet with a creak of its rusty hinges and pulls out Band-Aids and Neosporin.  She dabs the now-oozing scrape with ointment, then pokes through the box in search of a bandage that's the right size.  There aren't any, of course, so she lines up four small ones down the length of her wound where they look like oversized tan Frankenstein stitches.  
  
Job done, Nat's minor sense of purpose leaves her, and she feels like she's floundering in apathy again.  She drops her ruined shoe into the trash with her Band-Aid wrappers and rinses the residue of Neosporin off her fingers.  
  
_It's pointless_ , Nat thinks.  Why did she go and patch herself up first?  She's been wearing the same clothes since Tuesday, and a shower should have been the first order of business.  
  
Sighing again at her overwhelming incompetence, Nat starts stripping.  She flings her cardigan out the bathroom door, and it lands at the foot of her bed.  The "bedroom" of her studio is barely 8 feet by 10 feet, and it's separated from the rest of the space by a half wall that guarantees no privacy.  It's similarly sectioned off from the bathroom with a hollow-feeling door that won't close completely because it's misaligned in its frame.  
  
Nat sheds her blouse, which is disgustingly damp under the arms, and her narrow-leg trousers.  She tosses them onto the old brown carpet alongside the sweater.  
  
Nat is confident in her body; she'll fight just as easily in fishnets as in a leather suit.  However, she feels vulnerable uncovering her skin for the first time in four days.  And she's allowed to hate herself when she's alone.  
  
Nat unhooks the back of her push-up bra and drops it on the counter.  She's less curvy then everyone thinks, more of a full B than the DD she purports.  In reality, she has a slightly pear-shaped, mannish, athletic figure with not much of a waist.  It's the bombshell padding that creates the illusion of the sensual hourglass.  
  
Nat glances down; her tits look smaller than usual.  Not really surprising.  She wouldn't be astonished if she's lost weight what with the mission and the stress and the epic headache.  Nat uses her foot to edge the bathroom scale out from where it's jammed between the toilet and the wall.  She steps on, and the needle twitches around the 106 mark.  Nat squints to make sure she's seeing the blurry numbers correctly, and exhales through gritted teeth.  
  
The mental calculation comes automatically.  She's 5'4" flatfooted, and 106 gives her a BMI of something like 18.2.  She needs to make at 108 for the mandatory minimum healthy number of 18.5.  If her numbers are any less than those when she goes in for her medical debrief, she'll get at least a stern talking-to.  Fury's threatened her with counseling.  Maria's threatened her with lots of things.  But she'll usually forget to file the paperwork if Nat doesn't say anything when Agent Hill's hand finds its way into her bra.  
  
A wave of anxiety makes Nat's head throb, stomach clench, and self-hatred spike.  _She's stupid, she's terrible_. She can't take it anymore.  Nat shoves slightly greasy hair off her forehead and cups her aching sinuses.  She should have no problem gaining two pounds overnight if she eats a couple of square meals and drinks a few bottles of water.  But Nat doesn't want to think about food yet.  She has no appetite, and her physical and mental pain are driving her to old habits.  
  
Nat's learned the best ways to manage her stress.  She needs a moment at her worst before she starts pulling the pieces back together.  
  
It's been months since she's done it, but Nat's perfected the art over the years, and she remembers everything.  She kicks the scale back to its out-of-the-way spot and sinks to her knees as she puts up the toilet seat.  
  
She'll purge now.  Eat later.  Nat developed the technique early on in her SHIELD days, when she stopped being concerned with thinness and started actually worrying about her weight, or at least the narrow-minded guidelines SHIELD and the World Health Organization use to judge health.  
  
Nat sticks her right pointer finger down her throat and caresses her cheek and chin with the rest of her hand.  The skin in her mouth tastes metallic and salty, proof that she hasn't washed with soap in far too long.  Nat gags, but nothing comes yet.  
  
Her mind transports her back to Vaganova again, this time as a barely-pubescent 11-year-old ashamed of her budding breasts.  Her white-leotarded body crammed into the toilet stall beside a black-haired girl with an unfriendly giggle.  It was difficult the first time; it took a long time for the vomit to actually come.  And when it did, Nat pulled slimy fingers from her throat, wrapped a fist, and punched the other girl in the face.  
  
_Oh, fuck, stop_ , Nat thinks, pushing her finger back again.  She retches nothing again.  From many years ago she can feel that girl's bone fracturing behind her knuckles, sense the warmth of blood on her hand.  She doesn't think she ever saw that girl again after that.  
  
Finally the sip of rancid-tasting Starbucks comes up, thickened with mucous and bile.  Nat almost chokes on it, and toilet water splashes her in the face.  She pulls her finger out for a second to breathe, then jams it in again.  
  
_Three more_ , she tells herself.  Nat retches.  _You're stupid._  
  
_Two more.  You're worthless_.  
  
_One more.  God, stop thinking.  
  
Last one. _ Nat coughs and gags again after her finger is released from her contracting throat.  With the lapse in concentration, another uninvited scene starts.  _Steve approaches the cubicle.  "Are you ok?"_ _  
_  
"Argh," Nat groans, relying on the physical sound and movement to change the direction of her thoughts.  She spits into the toilet.  She can't stand Steve.  She can't stand herself.  
  
Nat flushes the toilet and drags herself upright.  Her head throbs harder than before, and vertigo makes it difficult to stand without reaching for the counter.  Breathing heavily, Nat turns on the shower so the water can heat up.  
  
She slips out of her clingy black underwear and realizes they're inside out.  They have been for the past 4 days.  _Stupid, stupid_ , Nat reprimands herself.  She digs her fingers into the skin at her hairline, unsure if she means to relieve the headache pain or add to it.  
  
Nat steps under the warm, steamy spray and tries to relax.  Her tense neck and shoulder muscles won't budge, even with some coaxing from her fingertips.  Nat wishes she knew how long this will last.  A neat red dot on her calendar, a week's worth of white sugar pills.  _Sorry, it's just that time of the month._ Or, even better, _give it 9 months and I'll be back to normal_.  It's a luxury Nat's not afforded.  Her SHIELD medical file clearly states she doesn't have a uterus.  Whether it's due to the graduation ceremony operation in the Red Room or if she never had one to begin with, Nat's not sure.  She's never had a period.  Maybe her teenaged self-torture paid off in amenorrhea.  Nat used to think it was a blessing.  Now it's a curse.  And another thing that makes her feel marginally female and even less human.  
  
Once out of the shower, Nat digs through the medicine cabinet again.  She hears her phone ringing back in the living room, but she ignores it.  Nat doesn't know if she expelled the Excedrin when she vomited, but regardless, it wasn't helping.  She fumbles with the top to the ibuprofen and jostles a few into her trembling hand.  Her vision is still blurry and Nat doesn't exactly care.  Nat counts more than two and not more than four as they pass down her raw throat.  
  
Nat robotically puts on lotion and starts combing her tangled auburn hair.  She breathes slowly and tries not to look at herself in the fogged mirror as she works through the knots.  It's satisfying to feel coarse strands go sleek and flat under her hands.  _You can chill out.  Everything is fine_.  
  
Everything is fine until Nat accidentally combs her ear and her vision dissolves into painful red sparks.  The comb clatters into the sink with the bloody washcloth from earlier, and Nat doubles over the countertop, squeezing her eyes shut.  Nausea surges for a second, and she swallows to keep from throwing up the pain relievers.  
  
As soon as she's confident she won't fall over, Nat opens the bedroom's tiny closet for clothes.  There is no clean underwear, so she yanks on black cycling shorts.  Goosebumps bloom on her arms and send her sparse strawberry-blonde arm hairs to attention.  Nat can't decide if she's really cold or if it's all some kind of illusion.  She grabs a gray FBI Academy sweatshirt from the closet floor and pulls it over her naked torso.  Nat tries to remember where it came from.  Maybe she acquired it during a mission.  Or, more likely, Maria did and it somehow eventually ended up in Nat's possession.  
  
Nat pads across the living room to retrieve her bag from where she threw it beside the front door.  The apartment is barren.  Aside from the bedroom and bathroom, the rest of the space is all living room with a strip of kitchen along one wall.  On the opposite wall, there's a half-populated bookshelf beside a torchier, which Nat flicks on.  The only real furniture is a threadbare taupe-colored La-Z-Boy.  Nat doesn't own a table, so the half-wall separating the bedroom from the living area is where she sets her phone and gun after taking them from her bag.  
  
As soon as she sets the phone down on the scuffed eggshell paint, Nat remembers that it rang a few minutes ago.  She presses a button to unlock the device, and it shows not one, but two missed calls.  Both from Steve.  Both with voicemails she chooses not to listen to.  She jams the phone into the kangaroo pocket of her sweatshirt and turns to the kitchen.  
  
Now, food.  Nat needs to refuel even though she still isn't hungry and feels faintly ill.  She opens the fridge and is met with a half-full bottle of vodka and a single-serve pot of ranch dressing.  The pantry's no better, it contains only paper products.  
  
"Shit," Nat says.  Why would she even think she would have groceries?  She'd just been gone for most of the week.  Nat's careful not to leave perishables.  She should remember her own habits for fuck's sake.  
  
She opens the fridge again and squats in front of it, clinging to the door.  Hopelessness assaults her with the chilled air and sends cold discomfort from her chest up to her head and back down to her feet.  Nat's barely dressed, her hair is wet, and she doesn't feel like she's safe to drive in her current dizzy, trembly state.  She's not getting food tonight.  Not that it matters.  She's not hungry anyway.  Fuck SHIELD, fuck medical, fuck any future missions.  The world can just burn up next time.  Maybe it'll burn Nat up with it.  
  
She grabs the vodka from the fridge and lets it set heavily in her hand.  The glass bottle sweats against her warm skin.  _Why not?_ Nat thinks.  She doesn't care anymore.  She hurts too much.  Getting shitfaced will numb the pain, or at least change it to something she understands.  
  
Nat lets the refrigerator close with an empty rattle and leans against the cabinets beside it.  One of the cabinets' handle aligns with the base of Nat's skull, and she relishes the pleasant pain as it bites into the sore muscle at the core of her migraine.  She unscrews the cap with a shaky hand and takes a swig of the fiery liquid.  It tastes sharp and chemical on her sensitive tongue and raw throat.  For a moment she's not sure it will stay down, but a second sip and hard swallow seal her gullet.  
___  
Time doesn't move linearly as Nat sits on the kitchen floor.  One leg stretches out long, her heel finding the dusty living room carpet as the rest of her is on the cold linoleum.  She raises the vodka to her lips again and notes how much lighter it is in her hand now that the contents are below the quarter-full mark.  She doesn't remember drinking that much.  It's raining outside, and the sound of the drops hitting the window is almost hypnotizing.  Nat still feels as though she just stepped off a sadistic carnival ride, but also floaty and uncaring and wonderful.  
  
There's a sudden clap of thunder and Nat starts violently.  The vodka bottle slips from her hand and hits the hard floor.  It smashes into a handful of large, jagged pieces and alcohol runs everywhere.  Nat scrambles into a crouch, her scraped foot stinging as the vodka seeps beneath her Band-Aids and re-sanitizes the wound.  
  
Nat's off balance and her heart is pounding from the startling sound still ringing in her ears.  She eases herself back onto the floor a few feet away from the spilled liquid.  She should pick up the broken glass, wipe up the alcohol.  But the only blossoming thought that crosses Nat's mind is the beauty of the gleaming wet shards.  She extends one finger to almost touch the diamond-like edge of one of the broken pieces.  Nat tracks the visual image of herself wrapping her hand around it until hot blood runs like Bordeaux down her arm.  
  
She doesn't have time to sort through her drunk mind and think it through- _Was it a plan?  Or just a fleeting idea?  One of those normal human thoughts that mental health inventories never account for?_ -when sound jars her again.  This time it's her phone ringing and vibrating against her stomach through the pocket of her sweatshirt.  It isn't until she accepts the call and says hello that she remembers who's been calling and why she doesn't want to answer.  
  
"Hey, Nat," Steve says, sounding relieved.  It's too late to hang up.  If she did that, he'd never stop ringing her.  
  
"Yeah," Nat murmurs, hoping she's not slurring.  
  
"You ok?  You didn't answer before."  
  
"Was in the shower," Nat explains.  She's slurring.  
  
"I just wanted to make sure you're ok," Steve says.  "You weren't looking so good earlier."  
  
"Thanks," Nat says sarcastically.  
  
"No, that's, I mean," he flounders.  "You looked like you didn't feel good."  
  
Nat pauses for a second.  She stares at the pattern of glass on the floor, and it doubles and crosses over itself as her vision loses focus.  Nat could pick up the sharp triangular piece (pieces?) in the center and jam it into her wrist.  _Maybe her soft, pale throat._  
  
Nat's eyes are suddenly welled with unexpected tears.  She doesn't cry.  She doesn't even drunk-cry.  "I don't," she says.  Her mind is full of half-formed panic.  _Why'd you-no-stop-don't say._ _  
  
_ "I'm coming, ok?" Steve says.  Nat hears him revving his bike.  "You're at home right?  I'm on my way."  
  
Nat's uncoordinated, and she ends the call before she whispers, "No.  Don't."  She sinks back to the floor and buries her face in her hands.  
___  
Nat starts for a third time when she hears the knocking on the door.  She must have been drowsing against the kitchen cabinets.  Nat staggers to her feet and becomes painfully aware that she doesn't feel well.  Oh.  She steps in spilled vodka and miraculously doesn't hit any glass.  _Ohhh.  Yeah.  That._  
  
The visitor knocks on the door again.  Nat reaches for her gun on the half-wall.  
  
"Nat?"  Steve's voice calls from outside.  _Him.  Oh.  Shit._  
  
Nat leaves the gun and dashes to the door.  She unlocks it and almost falls out on top of the large, wet man on her doorstep.  The rain is still coming down, and Steve has two plastic grocery bags hanging from each fist.  "Hey," he says.  "Can I come in?"  
  
Nat stabilizes herself on the door frame and takes a step back into the apartment.  She remembers now, he called and she went and admitted something's wrong.  Nat's been bleeding out from a gunshot wound and said she was fine.  She doesn't do this.  Steve knows she doesn't do this.  Which makes it all the more serious.  
  
Nat meanders across the room to lean against the half-wall as Steve puts his groceries on the counter.  He steps through the mess of vodka and broken glass, sighs, and says, "Ok."  
  
He turns to Nat, who doesn't make eye contact.  "What's wrong?" he asks.  
  
That's funny, Nat thinks, she has no fucking idea.  She sort of shakes her head while shrugging, and her voice disappears in another urge to cry that doesn't quite materialize.  It just steals her breath and makes her rub her eyes.  
  
"Can you tell me how you're feeling?"  Steve takes a couple steps closer to Nat.  
  
_Don't touch me,_ Nat thinks at him.  "Head hurts.  Bad.  Kind of dizzy.  Like, nauseous."  That's really it for the physicality of it.  She doesn't bother to articulate the anxiety, hopelessness, self-hatred, and nebulous cloud of fucked-up-ness that hang over her.  He has to know it's more than that, though.  Just a migraine wouldn't mess with her this much.  
  
"And you were drinking?" He finally asks.  "Is that, you know, what's making you feel bad?"  
  
"No.  Already did.  Excedrin didn't help."  Nat tries to make it a joke, but it just sounds sad.  Especially when she's having trouble enunciating an entire sentence.  
  
"Have you eaten?"  
  
Nat sighs.  "Tried to go to Starbucks.  Just couldn't stomach it."  
  
"You got sick?" Steve asks sympathetically.  
  
Nat shrug-nods.  She's not telling the particulars.  
  
"Ok," Steve murmurs, pressing his fingers together and taking another half-step toward Nat.  "Do you feel like you have a fever?  Can I check your temperature?"  
  
Nat's gun is resting on the wall behind her back.  It would take two seconds for her to snatch it up and shoot Steve.  Through the chest, probably, because it's a larger target than his head and she's shaking too badly to aim with precision.  "Don't touch me," Nat growls.  
  
"Ok," Steve capitulates, separating his hands and holding them open in front of his body.  "Alright.  I'm sorry."  He stays silent for a moment before he changes directions.  "Do you want to sit down?"  
  
Nat takes the 6 or so steps across the room to the La-Z-Boy, and Steve hovers at her shoulder.  Nat shouldn't be irritated; she probably is at risk of falling.  She rests her head back against the worn velour of the chair as Steve crosses back to the kitchen.  He uses the hand towel beside the sink to mop up the wet floor and transfer the glass shards to the trash.  They clink against each other and the sides of the plastic trashcan.  Nat wishes they didn't sound so cheerful.  
  
Steve rummages in one of the grocery sacks on the counter.  "I got you these," he says, holding up a pint of Ben and Jerry's and a packet of Biore strips.  "Well, the salesgirl picked them out, I wasn't sure what would make you feel better." Steve pauses, slightly embarrassed.  He looks down at the pale green Biore packaging.  "I don't actually know what these are.  Save them for later?"  
  
Nat bites her lip and nods.  So from the time he got to the grocery store, hell, probably from the time he left the SHIELD office, he'd been planning to drop by.  Cheer her up.  The thought redoubles Nat's nausea, and she draws her knees up to her chest and drops her forehead to them.  
  
The sounds of crinkling plastic and the fridge opening and shutting lets Nat know Steve is putting is groceries away.  In her kitchen.  Which means he's either sickeningly chivalrous or planning to stay.  Knowing him, it's both.  
  
"Ok, Nat?"  Steve says, crumpling up his grocery bags.  "You ok?"  
  
Though Nat can't see him, its plain he just turned around to see her curled in on herself.  The answer is obvious and Nat doesn't feel like talking, so she just gives him the finger.  
  
"Yeah, ok," Steve says.  "I'm going to get you something to eat, alright?  Anything in particular sound good?  Toast?  Pasta?"  
  
Nat drags her forehead out of her knees, her hair forming a curtain on either side of her face.  She squints at Steve's blurry form, unable to force out a response.  Fuck you, doesn't feel appropriate for the situation.  
  
"No?  That's ok," Steve says.  "I'll have something ready in 15 minutes or so."  
  
Nat stretches her sweatshirt so she can pull her bent legs inside it and puts her head back down.  This whole situation, Steve here mother-henning over her, is weird.  Uncomfortable.  Mortifying.  Something Nat doesn't know how to deal with.  
  
Nat's never had someone over to this apartment.  She has no friends, no relationships outside work and sex, which muddle together.  It seems like half the time her mission is to sleep with someone, and even when it's not, Nat feels as though she rarely gets out of the SHIELD facility without granting a favor.  
  
The first time Maria and Nat fucked each other senseless in the women's locker room, it was blissful.  It was after the attack on New York, and Nat was still full of thrumming adrenaline.  It started off and ended right, with kisses and sweet whispering.  It reminded Nat of the night years ago in Budapest when she had her one and only time with Clint.  The sex had been good, but then Hawkeye broke down, told Nat about his fiancée, and brought the slim chance at romance to a close.  
  
It all comes down to the same thing.  Nat knows how to give and how to receive.  She knows what sensations bring people to their knees to spill their secrets and come back for more.  What Nat doesn't know is how to feel.  She gets the pleasure, sure, but not the connection.  None of her escapades lead to relationships.  Nat wouldn't mind calling Maria her girlfriend if she would fucking reciprocate.  Maybe invite Nat to dinner.  But their contact has evolved into the realm of unhealthy negative reinforcement.  Maria forcibly feeling her up or using her seductive tones to whisper out negotiations instead of sweet nothings.  I won't tell Fury you came in underweight if.  
  
The sound of water running into Nat's flimsy saucepan brings her thoughts back to Steve.  She doesn't know how to react to him.  She has no memories of anyone being tender with her.  She's subconsciously dubious that he'd be so kind without an ulterior motive.  Nat and Clint managed to miraculously mend their bond after the failed fling, but he still doesn't talk to her outside work.  
  
So what is Steve's deal?  What does he expect in return?  
  
Nat takes a deep breath and lets her incoherent mind run away from her.  She sees herself lying nude on a black-sheeted mattress as a blonde-haired, black boxer-clad figure approaches.  He lies down beside her and rolls over, poking her in the hip with his erection.  She slides a hand into the boxers.  
  
Nat actually gags as she shoves the thought away and flounders for some other mental image.  Her brain brings her a cloud of fire and a car very much like her black sedan exploding against a backdrop of peaceful mountains.  She didn't even have to insert his face for the thought to turn sickening.  
  
"Nat?"  Steve's voice dispels the imagery as his big, warm hand crashes down on her shoulder.  "You alright?"  
  
"Get.  The fuck.  Off," Nat says with as much precision as she can muster.  She lifts her head to glare at him again.  
  
Steve backs up a couple steps, cardboard pasta box still clutched in his hand.  "Sorry," he apologizes.  He stands there for a few seconds, until it's clear Nat's not going to barf.  He returns to the stove and calls over his shoulder, "Hang in there.  This'll be done soon."  
  
Whether he's referring to the noodles on the stove or Nat's episode of drunk pain, she's not sure.  
___  
"Hey, Nat."  
  
Nat lifts her head, disoriented and groggy again.  Steve's holding two mismatched plates of curly-q pasta.  The whole room smells of butter.  It smells good.  
  
"Hm?" Nat asks.  
  
"Time to eat," Steve says.  "Do you want to sit there?"  He nods at the La-Z-Boy where she's still curled with her legs tucked into her sweatshirt.  
  
He's made himself a plate; there's no way he's going anywhere.  Which is a complete mystery, actually.  Nat's short-term memory isn't feeling strong at the moment, but she's fairly sure she's been behaving fairly rudely toward him.  And he's sticking around.  
  
"No, I'll." Nat doesn't finish her thought.  She slides her knees out of their cocoon and climbs out of the chair.  She tugs her shorts down from where they're riding up her crotch, then leads Steve around the half-wall.  Aside from the floor, the bed is the only place where two people can sit.  Maybe an attempt at acting like a decent human being will be more useful in getting him on his way.  
  
Nat arranges the pillows into a backrest against the low wall, sinks down on the foot-end, and adjusts herself so she's sitting cross legged.  Steve hands her a steaming plate and takes his seat at the head-end of the bed.  
  
The perfect white pasta is dressed in butter and salt, exactly what an ill person should want.  It looks good, but Nat still lacks an appetite.  She lifts her fork and pokes at the noodles before lifting one to her mouth.  She chews it slowly and swallows, hoping her stomach won't reject it.  
  
Steve takes his own meticulous bite, matching Nat's pace.  He probably doesn't want to seem like he's pressuring her to eat.  It's annoying and unbearably nice.  
  
They nibble in silence for a minute before the inevitable happens.  Nat practically counts it down.  _3.2.1…_ Steve sets his plate in his lap and says, "You've been having a hard time for a while?"  It's not really a question, but less decisive than a statement.  
  
Nat doesn't know what to say back.  She's already fucked.  He somehow knows everything.  Nat mentally renounces SHIELD again.  So what if Steve reports her for reckless self-destructive behavior.  She's so goddamn tired.  
  
The last sentence comes out verbally instead of mentally.  Fuck.  Now she's started a conversation.  
  
"How long has it been going on?"  Steve asks, casually sliding a noodle onto his fork.  
  
"Like, 20 years," Nat says without emotion.  It sounds melodramatic, but it's fucking true.  The stress and nightmares and headaches and mad desires to hurt herself have been coming since before she was a teenager.  
  
"But this, like, what you're feeling right now?"  Steve prompts.  
  
"Couple days."  Nat prays that's the end of the line of questions.  
  
"Why?" Steve asks.  Damn.  Nat realizes too late she must have said that out loud too.  
  
"'Cause I don't want to fucking talk about it," Nat says.  She takes a bite of her food and chews, although it feels heavy and gluey in her mouth.  
  
"And why's that?"  Steve prods, his voice still soft and gentle.  
  
Nat sighs, sets her plate in her lap, and presses between her eyes.  She runs her hand through her hair and whispers, "I don't know."  Silence sits heavily, and a lone tear drips down Nat's cheek, betraying her without the usual buildup of sinus pressure.  
  
"Hey, it's ok," Steve soothes.  "Whatever you're feeling, it's ok."  
  
"No it's not," Nat whispers.  "It's like." the words come in a sudden rush.  "What I do is fucking hard, and it fucks with me, like, messes with my head, and then…I don't know what to do."  She stabs a piece of pasta, but can't bring herself to put it in her mouth.  "And nobody cares.  They just want me to…to do my fucking job."    The emotion's brought vertigo, which has brought nausea back again.  
  
"I care," Steve says.  "I will do everything in my power to help you.  What do you need?  What can I do right now?"  He sets his plate down on the bed.  
  
Nat doesn't even try to respond; she can't tell if he means what he's saying and she's feeling foggy and overheated.  The nausea surges up from the basic annoying nausea that's been plaguing her for the last several hours to the kind that means vomit is imminent.  Her mouth feels spitty.  Nat swallows, but the ocean rising in her throat doesn't go down.  "This was so good," Nat murmurs thickly as she slides her half-full plate out of her lap and scrambles up.  "I'm sorry."  
  
She stumbles the few steps into the bathroom, jams the door closed as best she can, and falls to her knees in front of the toilet.  The pasta comes up first, then the vodka in huge, painful, liquid heaves.  
  
"Nat?  You ok?"  Steve calls, knocking on the door.  He can probably see her through the half-inch or so of space between the door and the frame.  
  
"Just-" Nat breathes through a wave of nausea.  "Hold on."  She retches again.  
  
Nat lets her forehead drop to the toilet seat.  It's as if the whole of the tiny room is vibrating; she's overtaken with tiny, fast-paced tremors.  Nat uses her teeth to scrape residual bile and mucous off her tongue.  She spits forcefully into the cloudy water, then flushes and uses the toilet tank to drag herself to standing.  
  
Nat holds an ancient water-stained mug under the faucet and rinses her mouth.  She catches her own eye in the mirror and is too mentally slow to force herself to look away.  Her still-damp hair is especially dark, and her skin is especially pale.  Nat's eyes are bloodshot, and the dark circles under them make her look as tired as she feels.  
  
Aside from the fact that she's freshly showered, Nat looks like the addict on the street no one wants to approach.  She looks terrible.  And sick.  And maybe she is.  
  
When Nat opens the bathroom door, Steve is hovering just over the threshold.  The food, thankfully, is gone, and the rich buttery smell is muted.  
  
"You ok?"  Steve asks for what seems like the thousandth time.  It seems like a travesty that the English language, with its multitude of expressions, doesn't contain a string of words exactly appropriate to the situation.  Steve's manners prevent him from directly asking if puking made her feel any better, so he's stuck with asking again if she is the one thing they've already concluded she is not.  
  
Nat shrugs in reply.  She isn't sure what to do.  She should lie down; she's still unsteady on her feet.  She wants Steve to go away, but somehow, also, she doesn't.  Something subtle has shifted inside her.  She must have expelled a little of her abrasive attitude into the toilet with the rest of her stomach contents.  Nat hasn't learned how to be friends yet, but now that the alcohol fumes in her head have diminished somewhat, she notices the way she feels marginally more settled with him here.  She's still not well, but the urge to hurt herself has gone down.  
  
Steve shifts his weight.  He half lifts his arm like he wants to pat her shoulder or check her temperature, then thinks better of it.  
  
Nat fleetingly regrets snapping at him earlier and decides that now she feels differently.  Touch might not be a bad thing now.  She takes the step out of the bathroom and onto the bedroom carpet.  The next step places her aching head against Steve's chest.  He automatically brings his arms gently around her waist.  
  
"Hey," Steve murmurs.  Nat tries to deduce whether his tone is soothing or dejected or inviting.   It seems like many layers of emotion are buried in the small word.  
  
"Hey," Nat whispers back.  The latest round of vomiting has wrecked her throat; she's hoarse and sore-sounding.  
  
"How are you feeling?"  Nat feels his voice in her temple and cheek and neck, set across the tempo of his heartbeat.  
  
"Just… sick," Nat admits.  
  
"Yeah," Steve says.  He draws one hand up between Nat's shoulder blades.  It rests there for a moment, and when Nat doesn't react to the touch, he trails it up to the back of her neck.  "I can't tell if you have a fever.  Do you feel warm?  Or cold?"  
  
"I feel like shit," Nat mumbles into his t-shirt.  The hand feels good on her neck, though.  The pressure slightly dampens the sting and soreness of her tense muscles.  She wants to maintain the contact, but her deeply rooted instincts tell her to break it.  "Should probably lie down," Nat says.  
  
"Ok," Steve says, unwrapping Nat and staying at her side with a hand on her back as she approaches the rumpled bed and pulls back the sheets.  
  
"I don't want to leave you yet," Steve says.  "Just, you know, want to make sure you're ok overnight."  
  
Nat glances at her alarm clock.  It's 10:30.  Early for her to call it a night, but she's tired enough to sleep for the next millennium.  Assuming she's capable of relaxing.  
  
"I can sit in the, uh, living room, in case you need anything," Steve says.  Nat doesn't want to look at him.  She can feel the situation edging into awkward.  
  
"No, stay here," Nat says.  She can deal with a bedmate better than she can deal with being babysat.  
  
"You sure?"  Steve checks in.  
  
"Yeah."  Nat pats the side of the double bed closer to the half-wall.  
  
"Ok."  Steve crawls up from the foot of the bed so he doesn't have to climb over Nat.  He lays on his side facing her.  She stays on her back.  
  
After a few minutes of slow breathing, Nat's not comfortable anymore.  It's the dilemma of being ill: thinking, _I'll feel so much better if I lie down, then doing that and realizing, I actually felt better standing up_.  She turns onto her side, away from Steve, and palpates the muscles in the back of her neck.  "Can you…?" she asks.  
  
"Yeah," he answers, reaching up and overlapping Nat's fingers.  He starts to gently press on the upward-facing left side.  Nat's about to tell him to skip to the more painful right side, but he finds a symmetrical knot Nat hadn't been aware of, and it's all she can do not to whimper in combined agony and pleasure.  
  
"That's a bad one?"  Steve asks.  
  
"Yeah," Nat breathes.  
  
"Ok."  Steve pushes deeply with the pads of his fingers and lets his thumb rest delicately at the top of her spine.  "Is this ok?"  
  
"Yeah," Nat chokes out again.  
  
"Try to relax."  His thumb gently strokes crests of protruding vertebrae down Nat's neck.  
  
Nat exhales slowly and tries again to drop her tension.  She's getting nowhere.  Her stress has been clenched between her shoulder blades for so long that it'll take much more than this to release it.  
  
After a minute, Steve starts working up under her hair into the base of her skull.  He starts to find the knot further to the right, almost in the pillow.  "Does this hurt?" he asks.  
  
Nat heaves herself over to free the right side of her body.  She props herself on her side to face him.  "Yeah," she finally answers.  "But don't stop."  
  
There are several inches between their bodies, but Nat can feel Steve's radiating heat.  He finds the problematic muscle again and digs into it, his forearm resting on Nat's shoulder.  "Ok," Steve whispers.  His voice has that multifaceted quality again: soothing and sweet burdened and tired.  
  
Nat's thoughts are less coherent than they were before.  Maybe she's finally relaxing into the mattress, or she's reached the sleepy stage of drunkenness.  She remembers a musing form earlier in the evening and mulls it over again.  What does Steve want?  Why is he doing this?  From what Nat knows of men, they don't care about people who aren't family or fuckbuddies.  
  
Number one rule of friendliness: turn the conversation on the other person.  "How was it?" Nat asks, "When you came back?  From the ice, I mean."  
  
The pressure reduces on Nat's neck.  Steve drags his hand across his face before returning it to rest under her hair.  "It was. Ah. It was tough.  I felt so weird.  I still feel really weird, but then it was like was feeling something no one else could understand, but everyone knew everything else about me."  
  
"Hm," Nat breathes.  
  
"Then there was the time-lapse thing.  When I woke up, for me it was just a few days after all the stuff that happened in '45.  You know, Zola, Bucky, all that."  
  
Nat affirms again.  
  
"But for everyone else, it was decades ago.  Before they were born.  Not important."  
  
As he goes on, Nat feels their similarities.  Steve's too kind and intelligent to say I understand, but he lays a foundation of his troubles that's, if not parallel, at least an intersection to Nat's.  
  
Then, out of the blue, "Do you sleep with a lot of guys?"  
  
"Huh?" Nat responds, not trusting herself to have heard correctly.  
  
"Shit, you don't have to answer that," Steve mutters.  He snakes his hand away and rolls onto his back.  They weren't exactly making eye contact before, but now the weak connection is gone.  
  
Nat's as surprised that he swore as she is by the question.  She cycles through a slow inhale and exhale.  "Some," she finally says.  "But…not recently.  Not really."  
  
"You don't have a…a boyfriend?"  
  
Nat pauses, first for drunken comprehension, then to calculate a response.  She wonders if he's ever heard of bisexuality.  She wonders if he's ever had sex.  Nat decides on, "No."  
  
"I thought maybe Barton." Steve trails off.  
  
"No," Nat murmurs.  "I mean, once, but…no."  
  
"Huh."  
  
Nat's arm is falling asleep as she lays on top of it.  She shifts slightly and pulls her elbow out from beneath her ribs.  She reaches forward and, without really knowing why except that it's habit, ghosts her fingers down the front of Steve's khaki's from the button down the fly.  The touch is light enough to be accidental.  Nat strokes him again to ensure it's not.  
  
Steve stops talking after she touches him a third time.  Nat feels his body start to respond after the fourth.  
  
"Nat?"  
  
She doesn't look at him right away.  Not a couple hours ago, the fleeting thought of a romantic encounter was vomit inducing.  Now, it's…not.  Nat blinks and slowly raises her gaze from his crotch up to his face.  She one-handedly fumbles with the button on his khakis.  
  
"Nat."  It's not a question this time.  More of a sigh.  
  
Nat releases the button and starts, tooth by tooth, on the zipper.  Nat can feel him, hard under the fabric.  
  
"Do, uh…Is this, do you want this?"  He sounds unsure.  
  
"You do," Nat says, dragging her fingertips across his tenting boxers through the open fly.  
  
"But, is this what you want?  Is it going to help?"  
  
"I don't know."  
  
"Nat."  His hand finds hers.  "I know you don't feel well.  I don't. Are you ...?"  
  
The question hangs in the air.  Are you going to remember this in the morning?  
  
"I think…I want to," Nat whispers.  
  
"Is this going to help?"  
  
"I don't know, but…maybe.  I think I want to try"  
  
They both stay quiet and still for a moment, then Steve pushes onto his side again, leans forward, and lets his lips press against Nat's forehead.  "Ok."  
  
Steve's lips taste good against Nat's, like rainwater and warmth.  He manages to free his legs from his pants, then closes the distance between them.  His arm comes around Nat's body, supporting her back, and she slides the pads of her fingers up his forearm, brushing all the hairs up the wrong way, before lingering on his elbow.  
  
Nat loops her hand under the waistband of Steve's boxers, sliding them down his hips.  
  
"I have, uh…protection.  Somewhere," he murmurs into Nat's cheek.  
  
"Don't need it."  
  
"Nat, come on."  
  
"I can't get pregnant."  
  
"Nat."  It's shock or pity or concern or I-don't-care-I'm-about-to-get-fucked.  
  
"'s ok," Nat whispers.  She gets the boxers down below his ass and shifts her hips against the bare erection.  
  
Steve kisses her again.  He brings one hand up under her sweatshirt to cup her breast.  
  
Nat shimmies her shorts down and frees one leg.  The spandex stays wrapped around the other ankle and intertwines with Steve's feet under the blankets.  
  
"Is this ok?" Steve whispers into her mouth.  His cock is pressed against her crotch with expectant heat.  
  
"Yeah," Nat breathes back.  
  
Steve gently rolls so Nat's on her back and he's hovering above her.  He passes his thumb over Nat's nipple with a feather light touch.  Nat holds his lower lip between both of hers.  
  
Steve moves against Nat, slowly sliding into her.  It's hot and tight and feels like pulling on jeans warm from the dryer.  Being with him is soothing even though Nat's body isn't quite sure how to take it.  
  
The pressure inside her is bordering on uncomfortable.  Steve's big and Nat wishes she had lube.  Romantic encounters are not things that normally occur in her home, so any supplies are kept elsewhere.  It's been a while since she's been with a guy, and go figure the power-hungry operatives she's used to fucking have comparably small dicks.  
  
"You ok?" Steve checks in again as he grinds his hips into Nat's.  
  
"Mm-hm."  
  
"Sure?"  
  
"Yeah," Nat whispers.  
  
Steve finds a rhythm, slowly skimming slightly forward and slightly back.  Nat's arm is around his shoulder, holding him to her and enveloping her core in his warm energy.  The first few pushes are still tight, but good.  And then...they're not.  
  
"Nat?"  
  
It's too much; it's starting to hurt inside her.  _It's fine, you can take it harder than that._  
  
"Hey.  You ok?"  
  
Nat bites her lip and can't keep the slight groan from escaping as the next throb is definitely painful.  
  
"Am I hurting you?"  
  
_It's fine.  It's fine it's fineit'sfine_. But Nat's body thinks otherwise.  Pain flares like barbed wire inside of her, and it carries to her stomach, her head.  
  
"Nat?"  
  
"I just, I-I," she breaks off in a partial sob.  
  
Steve immediately pulls out, collapses onto his side, and holds Nat to his chest.  
  
"I'm so sorry.  Are you ok?" he asks.  
  
"Yeah," Nat says shakily.  "I'm sorry.  I don't know what happened, I just...I'm sorry."  
  
"No, it's fine.  I shouldn't've."  
  
Nat takes a deep breath and a dry heave comes up from nowhere, startling them both.  
Steve bolts up to a partial sit-up.  "Are you-do you need-?"  
  
"N'I'm fine," Nat gasps.  
  
"Ok."  Steve lowers back to the mattress.  He runs his hand down Nat's arm comfortingly, and his dick twitches against her thigh.  
  
"Let me, here," Nat says, reaching out for his crotch.  
  
"No, it's fine," Steve tries to enunciate his chivalry around his obvious need.  "You don't, you don't owe...Just, it's fine."  
  
"But you need-"  
  
"It's fine."  
  
"But I can-"  
  
"Nat, stop.  I'll take care of it."  
  
"You can..." Nat gestures to the bathroom, in case he wants an artificial sense of privacy.  "God, I'm sorry."  
  
"It's fine, Nat.  Ok.  I'll be right back."  Steve crawls down the foot of the bed and crosses to the bathroom in two steps.  He's briefly backlit by the light coming from the torchier in the living room and his distorted shadow, all distended cock and hunched shoulders, flashes across the closet doors as he retreats into the bathroom.  
  
_The fuck did you do?  God, you're stupid, stupid_.  Nat covers her face with both hands and waits for him to stop fiddling with the door-that's-never-going-to-actually-close and just get on with it.  She hears him breathing slightly raggedly, along with the quiet rattling that betrays he's leaning against the sink as he beats it out.  
  
Nat can't stand to listen, so she bends over the side of the bed and reaches beneath it.  The blood rushes to her throbbing head as she fishes out the old shoe box, and her abs contract painfully as she comes right-side-up and collapses into the pillows.  
  
The box is for contraband and old memories, and Nat usually doesn't remember she has it.  After carefully lifting the faded lid, Nat sifts through an ancient pair of pointe shoes with bits of bloodied glass still in the toes, several cards of palladium, crumpled headshots of Maria and Clint and herself… and finally locates an almost-full pack of Marlboros and a tarnished silver lighter.  
  
Nat remembers taking the pack off the unconscious body of the Canadian trucker she'd decked in the subway station 4-maybe 5- years ago.  He'd catcalled her, made her so angry she missed her mark on the target, then gave in to brain bleed and ended up being a civilian casualty on the paperwork.  She'd stolen the cigarettes so she'd have an excuse to lean against the wall and loiter until her hands stopped shaking.  
  
She jiggles out a cigarette and lights it.  It tastes pretty stale, but Nat's never been much of a smoker-it would be impossible to do her job with a tobacco habit-and she doesn't really care anyway.  
  
Nat wishes she'd thought of this earlier, a smoke would have paired well with the sickening amount of vodka she'd consumed right out of the bottle.  Oh, well.  Slow torture is still torture.  
  
She taps ash out onto the carpet and blows smoke up at the ceiling.  The last words she spoke to Steve replay in Nat's ears.  _"Let me…you need…I can."_ It's the same emotionless shit she regurgitates to Hydra agents and…others.  Nat tries to backtrack to her frame of mind when Steve first slid under the sheets with her.  Did she actually think it was possible to make a connection?  Nat snorts under her breath and holds her finger against the burning end of the cigarette.  
  
Water runs in the bathroom, and then the door creaks open.  Steve stands hesitantly at the foot of the bed, his boxers back on, looking embarrassed and tired.  
  
"Are you smoking weed?"  
  
"I wish.  S'tobacco."  Nat's surprised he knows what marijuana is.  Were the 40s before or after Reefer Madness?  Nat can't remember.  She's just relieved she's doing something more shocking than he is.  Or just did.  
  
"I didn't know you smoked."  
  
"I don't," Nat says.  
  
"I don't mind if you do.  Back during the war it seems like everyone did."  
  
"Did you?"  
  
"Nah, I tried once.  I threw up and had an asthma attack."  
  
Steve's demeanor changes slightly, from embarrassed-sad to just sad.  Nat's not sure if it's because a memory is coming up or it it's something else.  
  
"Here, do you want one?"  Nat holds up the pack.  "They're kind of stale."  She re-shuffles the sheets beside her and uses her foot to scoot her discarded shorts over to her side of the bed.  
  
Steve crawls back up beside her and lays on top of the mussed bedding.  He folds one arm behind his head and reaches to take the lit cigarette Nat hands him.  
  
"Wow, yeah," Steve says with a cough.  "That's...wow."  
  
"Like you remember?"  Nat asks.  
  
"Yeah…kind of.  It uh, brings back a lot."  
  
Number one rule of friendliness.  "Like what?"  
  
Steve takes a long pause.  "Just…reminds me of Buck."  
  
Nat watches him sort through his emotions.  
  
"He tried not to smoke around me, but, there were times when he would lay on the bed, just like this, and, ah, god, he just looked so…so…"  
  
Nat sees the confused combination of nostalgia and desire and heartbreak on his face.  She fleetingly wonders who he was picturing while he was getting rid of his boner.  
  
"Yeah," Nat murmurs, breaking the silence so he doesn't feel like he has to say more.  
  
They stay there, chain smoking until the pack is empty.  The sound of rain still pattering on the window creates a heavy backdrop for the flick of the lighter and warm smoky breath.  Being equally uncomfortable makes them comfortable with each other again.  
  
Smoking on an empty stomach is stupid, but no more stupid than anything else Nat's done tonight.  When she's too queasy to take another puff of the smoldering butt between her fingers, she taps it out on the headboard and rolls to her side.  Steve spoons her, warm and soft.  
___  
When Nat wakes, her head is on Steve's chest and her hips are half-mounted against his.  She's trying to remember if there's a good reason she's naked from the waist down when nausea hits her like a tidal wave and she has to scramble into the bathroom to heave mostly smoke-flavored air into the toilet.  
  
"Nat?" Steve's sleepy voice calls through the not-quite-closed door.  "You ok?"  It seems like she's heard these words a lot lately.  
  
"Yeah," she chokes out.  "Fucking hungover."  
  
By the time Nat's expelled every residual speck of vodka and what feels like most of her stomach lining, she has a decent idea of what all happened last night.  The rather excessive amount of wadded up toilet paper in the trash confirms that her pieced-together memory is not as unlikely as it seems.  
  
Nat splashes water on her face and again examines her pallid complexion.  She looks the same as she did last night.  Maybe worse.  Thin, pale, tired, sick, _pathetic, stupid_.  
  
Nat grabs the ibuprofen from the cabinet and dry swallows two.  She re-caps the bottle and throws it forcefully against the counter so the sound of shaking pills will drown out the screech of her own thoughts.  
  
"Everything alright?"  It comes from the vicinity of the kitchen, along with the spring-loader sound of the toaster.  
  
Nat doesn't answer, but takes advantage of the empty bedroom and digs in the closet for a pair of jeans.  There still isn't any clean underwear, so she just pulls the denim on over her bare body.  Nat finds her shorts on the floor beside the bed and flings them into the laundry.  
  
She steps past the half-wall and into the living room.  A plate, a knife, and a tub of butter sit on the counter expectantly, and the toaster is internally glowing and yeasty-smelling.  
  
"Hey," Steve says.  
  
"Hey," Nat replies.  Awkwardness is hanging in the air.  She's not sure if she should say something about last night or just let it be, like smothering gas leaking from the vent in the corner.  
  
Toast pops up, and Steve grabs it, smears it with butter, and arranges the slices on the plate.  "I don't know if anything else helped you feel better," he says, "but this should definitely work."  
  
"Ok.  Yeah, I'm, uh."  
  
"You still don't feel well?"  
  
"Yeah," Nat says, palming her forehead.  "I don't know."  
  
They sit on the living room carpet and munch the bland breakfast.  Nat's still sick to her stomach, but she thinks her body's ready for food now.  Not to mention she'd be frustrated if she lost any more muscle mass.  She picks off the crust and chews on it slowly.  
  
"Thanks for this," Nat says, recalling that it's Steve's food.  "I can help you bag it back up so you can take it home."  
  
"No, I can go shopping again.  You should have food in the house."  
  
"I can get my own-"  
  
"No, it's fine.  You should rest."  
  
Something bugs at the back of Nat's mind; she has a feeling she has something to do.  She can't rest, she has… something.  "Oh, shit."  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"What time is it?" Nat asks, glancing around and squinting at the microwave clock.  
  
"7:10," Steve reads over her head.  
  
"Fuck," Nat says.  "I was supposed to do my medical debrief 18 minutes ago.  They're gonna call and wonder what the fuck I'm doing."  Nat drops her toast and scrambles to her feet.  
  
"Wait, hold on," Steve says.  "You didn't go last night?"  
  
"No, I thought I'd feel better if I chilled out and went in the morning.  That didn't turn out."

 

“Do you want to go? I can drive you.”

 

Nat sinks onto the arm of the La-Z-Boy, fluffs her hair off her forehead. She doesn’t want to go. _Come on, Nat, just enunciate that._

 

“Nat?”

 

“No.”

 

“Huh?”

 

“I don’t want to go,” she finally gets out.

 

“Ok,” Steve says. “And is there a reason there? Besides what happened last night? A reason you didn’t want to go last night?”

 

“I don’t know…” Nat groans. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

 

There’s a beat of silence, and Steve says, “Remember what I said? I’ll do anything I can to help you be ok. It doesn’t matter if you don’t want to talk about it, there are things I don’t want to talk about…”

 

 _Like that you fucked Barnes_ , Nat thinks. _Just like I fucked Hill. But you probably loved him._

 

“Nat, it’s fine,” He continues. “So don’t go to medical. Take some time, get to feeling better.”

 

“They’ll put it in my file,” Nat says hollowly.

 

“So what? Nat, you’re allowed to be sick. You’re allowed to take time off.”

 

Nat sighs.

 

“I’m gonna help you, even if you don’t want to help yourself,” Steve says. He’s on his feet now, stooping to Nat’s level.

 

Nat’s phone rings.

 

“That’s Hill?” Steve asks.

 

“Probably.”

 

Steve retrieves the phone from the floor beside the La-Z-Boy and presses it into Nat’s hand. “Tell her you’re not coming. You’ll come by later. When you’re feeling better.”

 

Nat takes a breath and answers the call.

 

“Yeah.”

 

"You're running behind," Maria says.  
  
"Yeah, I overslept," Nat replies.  It's not actually a lie.  
  
"You're on your way, right?  So I don't have to file the form for missed debrief."  
  
"Mm, no, not today.”  
  
"You ok?  I was…looking forward to seeing you,” Maria says with a slight purr.

 

“No,” Nat sighs.

 

“Well, I’ll have to put it in your file. Inform Fury.”

 

“Yeah, well, maybe you should.” Nat hangs up.

 

__

 

Steve is across the room, scraping toast crumbs into the sink. And he’s smiling.

  
  
__  
**_But she's gonna let it burn baby burn baby  
  
She's just a girl and she's on fire_**  
__

 

 


End file.
